Is Netflix’s Veronica Scary?

Is Veronica the scariest movie ever, as people suggest? Or is it just like any other horror movie?

I kept seeing on my Facebook news feed that a horror movie, with no publicity from Netflix, magically appeared overnight online back in February. The headlines read, “Netflix’s Latest Horror Veronica Might Be The Scariest Movie Of The Year” (Metro, 2018). “Netflix’s new horror film Veronica dubbed ‘scariest ever’” (Mirror, 2018). And, “Netflix horror movie ‘Veronica’ is scaring people into shutting it off halfway through watching” (Business Insider, 2018).

According to Rotten Tomatoes, as of typing this article, the TOMATOMETER is giving it an average rating of 7/10, with two Rotten and 14 Fresh. But, the AUDIENCE SCORE is 3/5 with User Ratings of 739 having it at 45 percent of the users liking the movie.

IF YOU NEED A MOVIE TO WATCH, WATCH VERONICA ON NETFLIX 10/10 V GOOD/SCARY ….. ok im typing this as I just witnessed the ending and wow PLS WATCH THIS MOVIE I have fucking chills

Verónica (Veronica) is in Spanish, but you can listen to the audio in Portuguese, French, German, and Italian. The subtitles are in English, French, simplified and traditional Chinese.

The movie stars Sandra Escacena as Verónica. Bruna Gonzalez as her sister, Lucía. Claudia Placer as her other sister, Irene. Ivan Chavero as her brother Antoñito. Ana Torrent as her mother, Ana. Angela Fabian as her friend Rosa. And Carla Campra as the other girl with her when using the talking board, Diana.

Paco Plaza directs the movie. He, along with Fernando Navarro, wrote the script.

What is Veronica about?

The official synopsis, per Netflix:

In 1991 Madrid, after holding a séance at school, a teen girl minding her younger siblings at home suspects an evil force has entered their apartment.

My synopsis:

Fifteen-year-old Veronica, and her friend Rosa, and another schoolmate, Diana, sneak down to the storage area of their school while the other students and teachers are outside watching the solar eclipse. Diana wants to contact a friend who died in a motorcycle accident, but Veronica has someone else in mind to reach.

Strange events happen while they are using the talking board and Veronica is injured. Over a three-day period, strange events occur in her home. What did Veronica unleash, and what does she have to do right; what she did wrong?

If you have seen the movie Ouija (2014), then you pretty much get the gist of the storyline. Teens play with a talking board, something happens, and they forget to do one thing. While they go about their day, bad things happen. They later find out about the one thing that can stop it all and try to do it before anyone else dies.

Screenshot of “Veronica” via Image: Netflix/Sony Pictures. Verónica looking at a new Ouija board she bought to replace the one that broke.

Is the Veronica film based on real events?

According to Newsweek and other news sites, the movie is ‘loosely’ based on a case dated back to 1991, in Vallecas, Madrid. Estefania Gutierrez Lazaro used a talking board, but a nun broke it. The events did not happen over three days but took a few months. The girl saw doctors, but they could find nothing wrong. She died, and her parents experienced paranormal phenomena before and after her death. They moved out of their home, and the new owners have said they have experienced nothing.

So is Veronica good?

Director Paco Plaza took inspiration from the Vallecas Case and created something out of it. It is not a bad movie. It is good, and it is different due to it lacking what we normally see in horror films. Plaza incorporated some twists. One, no sex scenes (Kudos). It shows you don’t need sex to have a good horror film. Two, there is death, just not like what we are used to in a horror film (Kudos for that too).

Yet the Veronica also have slow pacing in a few parts, and is not scary as everyone says it is. Sure, there ‘scare’ points, but if you’re entering it on the back of what Twitter and other websites are saying, you may be disappointed.

I also kept thinking of previous movies such as the Ouija films and the nun in the Conjuring films, and their similarities.

I was able to watch the whole film, and I was not scared (go me?). For this horror fan, Veronica is interesting, but it is just not scary.